#so basically cornley watching a production of tptgw

[personinthepalace]

#actually i have more thoughts on this#robert as toph because he's loud#this is his idea of premium acting#so trevor running around doing special effects#annie playing all the minor characters/extras#chris as zuko#trying to play him seriously despite the play#sandra is more like the version of katara in the play#but i think she'd want the cooler lead#so sandra as azula#vanessa would be katara#and at some point it would become painfully obvious she's just copying sandra#causing a fight#max would be sokka#chris would think his happy and silly nature would come in handy for once#but of course something goes wrong anyway#actually max might also play uncle iroh#and then i'm torn when it comes to the rest#if we were faithful to the woman being cast as aang bit#we could put lucy as aang#but that isn't really striking me#if lucy appears at all in the play#i think it would be hilarious for her to play ozai#which leaves either dennis as aang#who is supposed to be the animated main character#who is instead stiff and forgetting his lines#OR jonathan as aang#and have him always kept out of sight by things going wrong with set effects costumes props flying wires etc via @dolphelecat

Ok, but hear me out. Cornley puts on The Boy in the Iceberg by Pu-on Tim and previously performed by the Ember Island Players.

[the-irrelevant-trumpeter]

okay so there is a massive fucking dilemma about when the play that goes wrong is set. (obviously, for the sake of just going and watching the show, it really does not matter. but it matters a lot to me personally, as someone who enjoys creating a cornley timeline in their spare time, so i will be overanalysing everything to the ends of the earth. godbless).

SO. here's my breakdown of all the things we know about when tptgw is. my goal is to make as many different pieces of lore fit as possible, but if in the end i get really desperately stuck, i am willing to say "hey this just messes eveything up" and get rid of it. also worth saying that all of this is literally just a direct stream of consciousness of me trying to figure it out for myself, so really, you're just coming along for the journey. therefore, if all of this is complete gibberish, apologies, i tried my best.

in the bbc peter pan goes wrong, trevor says that he's been the stage manager for cornley for about 5 years

this means it has to have been about 5 years since tptgw, since trevor wasn't the stage manager in this show. he only became stage manager when annie quit after tptgw. bbc ppgw aired on 31st december 2016. this means that tptgw has to be late 2011/early 2012. what qualifies as this depends on how relaxed you believe trevor's definition of "about 5 years" is.

in the tptgw program, the next item in the list of "upcoming cornley productions and events" is stated to be 13-17 january

this places tptgw as late one year or very early the next. this could support the above theory of being late 2011/early 2012, probably december or january.

in the tptgw script, chris welcomes the audience to the cornley polytechnic drama society's spring production of the murder at haversham manor.

this line is often omitted in stage performances given that tptgw is now performed throughout the entire year, but in both the 2nd and 3rd editions of the script, chris states that the production is taking place in spring — aka march, april or may. this obviously does not support the previous ideas about december/january. HOWEVER, if you're really willing to push it, here's an idea to make it work. this is just purely based off of my research of the british education system, so if i'm incorrect on any of this, i can only apologise and tell you that i've literally done my absolute best. also some of this info may seem basic to my british mutuals, but it was a lot to learn for me and therefore i will talk about it as if none of you know this.

so in england, the school year is broken into three terms — autumn, spring and summer. these are approximately broken up as so:

now as you may notice, the spring term actually starts in early january. when specifically in early january? i'm so glad you asked. in the 2011/2012 school year, aka our current hypothesis about when tptgw takes place, this is an overview of when the terms start and finish:

(this calendar, as stated, is specific to central bedfordshire, but i checked multiple different sources from multiple different universities and governments, and they're all about the exact same dates as this one. i've just chosen this particular one because it's easier for me to visualise it in this nice calendar form, rather than just being told the dates.)

so, the spring term in 2012 starts approximately on the 4th of january. this means that, potentially, tptgw could take place very early january, before the 13th when waiting for godot starts, while still being part of the spring academic term, and therefore, technically, a "spring production". while this does work on a technical level, i'm not a huge fan of this, purely because by "spring production" i envision it being a production they developed over the spring term, and then actually performed later in the term (eg march). it feels a bit weird for their "spring production" to kick off in the first of second week of the term. there ARE explanations for this. my best one is that after receiving max's donation later the previous year, chris managed to get them into the west end, and then worked the society throughout the holidays to get it ready by the very start of the next term. but then the phrasing of "spring production" feels weird, because it's not really a spring production anymore, because it's on the west end and now outside of the academic calendar.

the other way to get rid of this issue is to just discount either the spring production information or the upcoming events information. if you get rid of the spring production lore, you can easily just go back to having it in december 2011/january 2012 without the stress of trying to justify why chris calls it that. if you write off the upcoming events as some sort of mistake someone makes while creating the program (eg. copying and pasting the information, like i originally suggested), then you could easily say that tptgw was later in the spring term, like around march (which also just officially puts it in spring anyway), while still being early enough in the year for it to have been "almost 5 years" since trevor became the stage manager.

so that's that then? issue solved? unfortunately, no, because only today, i looked into a piece of lore i had overlooked.

in the tptgw program, cornley stole a review from the evening standard about the donmar warehouse's all female production of julius caesar, and pretended it was about their (presumably recent) production of hamlet.

now, for this to make sense, tptgw has to have taken place after this particular production ran and this review was written. wanna know when this is?

fucking 2013. immediate spanner in the works.

so then. how do we reconcile this. the biggest issue is obviously trevor's five year line, as if tptgw is in 2013, that leads to being about four years, at the most. so that's obviously a problem. but then, i got thinking. is it canon anywhere that tptgw is trevor's first show with the society? i think the "just doing it to get his electronics module" idea made me (and everyone else) automatically assume that it's his first show, but there's a possibility that he could have been involved in previous productions. obviously he wasn't the stage manager until after tptgw, but the possibilities are that:

he did some sort as an asm and therefore can claim he's been stage managing cornley for 5 years

he was still doing lighting and sound previously, but as we see in tptgw, he gets quite involved in stage stuff anyway, so maybe he just considered himself a stage manager there anyway.

so my running theory is that trevor was involved in the cpds during 2012, but then maybe left for a bit (maybe after a falling out with chris or something like that). then, he rejoined in tptgw to get the credits for his module in early 2013, and then stuck with them (obviously). as i said, i don't think there's much that could contradict trevor previously working in shows. the only one i can think of is this from the ppgw program:

which implies that tptgw was his first. however, i was already not particularly keen on accepting this as canon, just because, based on the amount of time between tptgw and ppgw, and based on the five years line, it would be weird for him NOT to be in shows in between. i haven't figured out exactly how to justify this, but it's one of those things that i just cannot accept as true. so we're ignoring it or finding an explanation for it (but later) and moving on!

so then. tptgw has to be after 11th january 2013 (when the evening standard review came out). this makes it hard to believe that tptgw took place before waiting for godot (13-17th january) because that leaves a two day gap for that program to be made. so i think we can safely decide that that particular piece of lore will have to be justified as a mistake that cornley themselves made in the program.

the spring production information actually fits very well with this new timeline, as it's a decent enough time apart that realistically, cornley could have found the review, pretended it was for hamlet, and then put it in the tptgw program. and then also, as i said, makes the timeline of the school term more realistic. they could have worked on tptgw all term as one of their spring productions (because with the number of shows we have listed as them doing, there must be several shows per term) before making it onto the west end. so, if we look at the 2012/2013 academic year calendar:

(this one is from brighton & hove city council, but once again, i checked multiple sources and this is the same as most others).

the spring term starts 7th january and goes until 28th march. therefore, i think it's reasonable to place tptgw as early march, since that puts in late in the term (giving them time to actually prepare the show, while also placing it in an actual month of spring).

SO, to sum up: i am placing tptgw as march 2013. the "upcoming cornley events" thing was an outdated copy of it that was placed in the program accidentally. trevor, while only officially gaining the position of "stage manager" after tptgw, previously worked with the cpds in roles that he considers to be enough to make him a "cornley stage manager" for about five years.

if you've made it this far, you're either as insane as i am (🤝) or you're a very loyal mutual (ily mwah). if anyone has any alternative ideas, theories, or suggestions, or you just want to tell me to get a life, my askbox and comments are open. remember, this is just my personal interpretation, and you do not have to agree with a single thing i said if you don't want to. canon is a construct. time is a construct. you can do whatever you want all the time. peace and love <3

me, literally only 8 hours ago: oh yeah cornley lore is flexible, you can make whatever work.

me right this second, trying to decipher this fucking timeline: if i don't make all of this make sense together i will literally combust.

[dolphelecat]

#hope you don't mind me broadcasting your tags haha#but OMIGOD I AM OBSESSED#okay so I technically haven't officially watched atla yet (I know I know)#but I have watched a million clips over the last few weeks#and have been accused of knowing too much for someone who hasn't watched the show (staring at you odd squad server)#but ANYWAY#LOVE THE CASTING#robert would totally play toph hahaha#chris with zuko's scar on the wrong side#I agree that sandra would be most like ember island katara but her as azula would be fun#I feel like she would also want to play aang just bc he is technically the main lead#or! annie could somehow play aang and all of the minor parts at the same time haha#but I love the idea of dennis playing aang haha#I feel like jonathan as ozai would be funny as well#oh! and someone definitely gets knocked out at some point and trevor has to take over#I love this idea so so much#also made me think how funny it would be if cornley saw an ember island play of themselves#so basically cornley watching a production of tptgw#and they just criticize it the whole time haha (except max bc he is just really excited and happy about whoever is playing him haha)#cornley au#cornley polytechnic drama society#ember island players#atla au#cornley atla au#atla#avatar the last airbender#mischief theatre#mischief comedy via @personinthepalace

Ok, but hear me out. Cornley puts on The Boy in the Iceberg by Pu-on Tim and previously performed by the Ember Island Players.